Two Miles
by apyrateslyfe4me
Summary: She had a feeling that the boy would turn out special. But she didn't like to think it was beause of her birthday gift; that would just be selfish. The real story of the porcupine necktie. One-shot.


Stargirl is one of my absolute favorite books. I always feel so bad for her, and so disgusted when she changes. :( I actually had a dream about the book last night, but instead of Stargirl being grilled on the Hot Seat, it was Demi Lovato. It was so sad. I think I'm watching too much Disney Channel.  
I don't own Stargirl, nor the characters.  
Enjoy!!

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She had always had a knack for sewing. Certain things came easy to her; certain, strange things that people would never think of. For instance, she doubted that any adult she had ever met (or never met, even) would think that she, of all people, would like to sew. She knew what they thought about her: how she probably would prefer swimming with dolphins, or painting Dali-esque portraits with secret messages hidden in them, or passing out flowers at a peace rally in San Francisco, or doing tribal dances in a secret Indian reservation.

Just to set the record straight, she had never been a fan of Dali's, and, unfortunately, she had never been so San Francisco. Which was too bad, because it seemed like just the sort of place she would enjoy.

But her mother and father were always ready to believe the seemingly impossible for their daughter. In fact, they were so ready to believe it that really nothing seemed impossible. And it wasn't just one of those "my-child-is-better-than-yours" attitudes, either. They knew quite well that some other children were far more capable to do some things more than their daughter was, like score that winning goal in the soccer game and repair a broken bicycle tire. But they also knew their daughter did not need any assistance from them to achieve her dreams.

But this is not to say they weren't willing to lend a hand when she needed it.

So when she had approached them with a smallish newspaper clipping and told them she needed this many yards of yellow silk and such-and-such colors of fabric paint, they had happily obliged. Anything to lead their daughter on a life quest as exquisite as her own.

So there she was, sitting in front of her sewing machine, thinking to herself. Yes, it would have been easier just to visit the Menswear department at the local Macy's, but she thought—she knew, actually—that there was something really beautiful about giving a handmade gift. Even if the receiver of said gift would never know whom it was from. Oh, well.

When she had finished sewing the tie, she had practiced tying the thing around the neck of her father. It looked quite dapper on him, to be sure, and she had even thought of using the leftover silk to make the boy another tie, but she realized that she wasn't doing this for her father. She was doing this for the boy, whose birthday was soon, and she knew he so longed for a porcupine necktie.

The next step was procuring a ride to the local library, because she wasn't entirely sure of the correct anatomy of a porcupine, and, being a person such as herself, she didn't own a computer of her own at home. The ride was the simple part: all she had to do was pump up her bike tire and ride fifteen minutes to the small building. The second easiest part was finding enough change to print of several pages of porcupine photos: that large jar that sat so squattily on the dining room table had remained untouched for several months now, and she had been sure that the coins were just begging her to use them.

The hard part was actually finding the websites about porcupines. She had started to search by herself for a little while, but when she realized that most of the websites she was looking at were just text with no pictures, she soon logged out of the computer and wandered into the children's section. Most of those books were for little children who had no real interest in the actual anatomy about Patrick the Porcupine, but she found them cute, and they would be much more of a help than a photograph, to be sure.

The coins were returned to their jar after she pedaled back home, the books securely placed into her basket. She had wasted no time with painting that tie with porcupines, seeing as she had only started that day and the boy's birthday was, in fact, yesterday.

But, oh, how cute they had turned out! Two little porcupines playing darts with their quills, while another smiled as he cleaned his teeth. She smiled at it lovingly. Even if Leo, the boy, didn't like it, she knew she did.

The next day, after running her fingers over the now-dried tie, she had pulled out the phone book and flipped to the section entitled **B**. A sigh when she had seen the three Borlocks who lived in her county escaped from her lips, but she picked up the phone just the same. The first two were not at home, so she didn't get to ask them.

"Hello?" came a kindly voice on the other line.

"Hello," she said cheerfully. "Is this the Borlock residence?"

"Yes, it is. May I ask who is calling?"

She froze, and then shot a glance at the newspaper clipping. "This is—Annabel Markin," she said, hoping his mother would not hear through her lie. "From the _Sun_?"

"Oh, hello!"

"Yes. I am calling in regards to the birthday column of your son, Leo?" she said. "Yes, well, one of our guidelines here is to always get the address of the family or person who is mentioned in any type of column, just to have on file in case we need to use the column for a future story. So we can contact you."

"Why would Leo's clipping need to be used for a later reference?"

"Well—" She did not have a response for this. "I've heard—from our editor—that we are in the process of running a column about exquisite citizens—" yes, that would do nicely "—and that last bit about your son collecting neckties? We find that very exquisite indeed."

"Oh, well…" and here she could hear his mother smiling "…in that case…"

And she had received his address without even a hint of doubt.

She had ended up placing the necktie in an old shirt box from her father, which was placed into a plastic bag, which was then wrapped with a yellow ribbon, which was then placed into the basket on her bicycle, and she pedaled those two miles to the boy's house. When she arrived, no one was there, and that was how she would had preferred it.

She swung her leg off the bicycle and walked to the front of his house, carrying the package in her hands. She hesitated before she left it there, looking at it carefully, almost like she was watching it. And, just before she left it on the doorstep, she pulled it in close to her body, hugging it, and then brought it to her lips and kissed it.


End file.
